


Not Wild Nor Tamed

by Black_Crystal_Dragon



Category: Sherlock (TV), Temeraire - Naomi Novik
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Dragons, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Dragon Sherlock Holmes, Dragons, Episode: s01e01 A Study in Pink, First Meetings, Gen, How Do I Tag, Old Fic, inspired by Temeraire, no Temeraire knowledge required
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-17 14:14:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,517
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29473059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Black_Crystal_Dragon/pseuds/Black_Crystal_Dragon
Summary: What ifSherlockwas set in theTemeraireuniverse? A reimagining of John and Sherlock's first meeting, with a draconic twist.
Relationships: Sherlock Holmes & John Watson
Comments: 4
Kudos: 14





	Not Wild Nor Tamed

**Author's Note:**

> Originally written in 2012, first posted online (with minor tweaks) in 2021 for International Fanworks Day.
> 
> Set in a modern day (2010) version of the _Temeraire_ universe. No knowledge of _Temeraire_ is actually required beyond: dragons exist. Dialogue taken directly from 'A Study in Pink'.

The presence of dragons in the streets never really bothered John. Growing up in a small town hadn’t given him many opportunities to see them, but life in the armed forces had made him less wary than most. In fairly recent history, military dragons and soldiers had been separated and the former treated with a great deal of fear. Now, however, anyone who wanted to fight for Queen and country had to be willing to live virtually cheek to jowl with dragons.

He could understand why they were feared, of course. He had seen first hand what they were capable of, and treated the resulting wounds. There had been plenty of burns from dragons’ flames and acid, but lacerations from teeth and claws were just as common. Whether they were monstrously large or deceptively small, dragons could do a great deal of harm.

Yet seeing them walk down the specially designed and modified roads of London didn’t make him want to shy away or lock himself up in his bedsit and never come out again. The sight of them sunning themselves on the grass in Hyde Park had more than once brought a smile to his face. The dragons he had met in Afghanistan had been just as fond of the light and heat — big lizards, he supposed — and had lain in the sand wearing reptilian grins, perfectly happy to let soldiers and aviators alike crowd into the shade cast by their spread wings. He found himself returning to the larger parks any day when there was even a hint of sun, just to look at them.

Not that there were many dragons with the time to laze around, even if their Captains would allow it. Most were what the government termed ‘gainfully employed’, though no one ever seemed inclined to give specifics on what that actually meant. John suspected that they were strongly encouraged to go into military or courier service, and those who declined were packed off to the breeding grounds dotted around the country. What else could a dragon do? There were still those who resented having them on the streets and feared them as they would a wild animal — which John found particularly irritating. Feral dragons were a nuisance, but they didn’t attack people. There were regular reports on the news about stolen livestock, but really, when they were forced either to risk their lives for the military or their health running messages around the globe, with no hope of any other ‘gainful employment’ to pay for their meals, was it any wonder?

* * *

The previous night’s dreams had been the worst since John was discharged from hospital. He got up, made his bed out of habit, and sat staring at his walking stick for a good fifteen minutes before he had the courage to limp over and pick it up.

Dragons were always good for a distraction, even if he could only watch them from afar these days rather than making conversation as he had during his active service. It was overcast when he ventured out of his bedsit, but he made his way to the park anyway. If nothing else, the clear space above would let him watch them crossing overhead. However, on this occasion, he was lucky: he was walking down one of the paths, trying to ignore his own uneven gait, when a dragon swooped in low over the trees, close enough to make them bend towards the ground as it passed by. He smiled, watching as the creature landed gracefully. It was a mid-weight dragon, on the small side, but John had seen smaller in combat before. A lone aviator climbed down from its back, presumably its Captain.

“John Watson?”

He turned, his name forcing his attention away from the dragon. There was a man sitting on a park bench. He was around his age and overweight, and vaguely familiar. John couldn’t come up with the name, so when the man smiled at him and reintroduced himself as Mike Stamford, he was grateful.

“Last thing I heard, you were overseas getting shot at,” he said when they had shaken hands. “So what happened?”

John glanced down at his walking stick and wondered if Mike was pretending not to see the pronounced limp. “I got shot.”

* * *

They ended up at Barts, John feeling slightly foolish as he limped along the pristine white corridors. ‘C’mon, who’d want me for a flatmate?’ had sounded so innocuous in his head — but now, all the signs indicated that he was going to be paired up with a similarly-impossible and probably brilliant research doctor. He felt inadequate already.

“Here we are,” Mike said as they reached a lab that looked no different than any of the others. He pushed open the door and held it.

John glanced around as he entered, taking in the lab and noticing things that had changed. “Bit different from my —”

The words died in his throat as his eyes stuttered to a halt on the figure at the other end of the room. Though roughly the right height and clearly engrossed in something on the counter, it wasn’t human.

A dragon, the smallest adult John had ever seen, was sitting up at the counter with its fore-claws resting on the edge. It was remarkably slim and appeared even more so with its wings folded tightly along the curve of its spine. Its tail was as long as the rest of its body and neck, and lay twitching itself into serpentine waves as the dragon peered at a couple of beakers. On either side of its head, thin, quill-like spines protruded from the skin and pointed back along its neck, joined by delicate webs of skin. Aside from these head frills and a slightly raised ridge along the creature’s back, its scales were an unbroken expanse of deep and inky black, but they shimmered with muted colours where they caught the light, like a magpie’s wing.

“Mike, can I borrow your phone?” the dragon said without looking round. The voice was deep and masculine, received pronunciation clipping the words.

“And what’s wrong with a land line?” Mike asked.

“I prefer to text,” the dragon said.

John’s eyes immediately snapped to its front claws — but ‘claws’ was the wrong term. Clever breeding or some genetic anomaly had gifted this dragon with claws that looked more like human hands. There were still the talons, clearly visible even though they were retracted, and he had only three short fingers, but with a thumb he was dextrous enough to hold a pipette — and to text, apparently. John had never seen anything like it before.

“Sorry,” Mike said. “It’s in my coat.”

“Uh, here,” John offered, taking his phone out, curious to see a dragon perform the task. He looked up to find the dragon staring at him with piercing, grey eyes, the most intelligent he had ever seen in either humans or dragons. He swallowed hard and limped to the edge of the workbench, holding out his mobile. “Use mine.”

“Oh,” the dragon said, casting a glance in Mike’s direction. “Thank you.”

He twisted his body and dropped down onto all fours. John frowned: he had been expecting the dragon to be bipedal, given the abnormality of his front claws, but apparently that wasn’t the case. The dragon’s head dropped down into its neutral position as he padded across, putting his eyes roughly level with the bottom of John’s ribcage.

“It’s an old friend of mine,” Mike said as the dragon approached. “John Watson.”

When the dragon reached John, he folded himself onto his haunches and reared up, lifting his head and neck into a position of comfort and resting some of his weight in his tail. He reached out with one slender foreleg and plucked the phone from John’s fingers.

He flipped the phone open, half-turning away, and said, “Afghanistan or Iraq?”

John tilted his head, glancing suspiciously at Mike, who smiled but said nothing. John said, “Sorry?”

“Which was it, Afghanistan or Iraq?” the dragon asked, turning to fix him again with those grey eyes. This time, John noticed that the pupils were slitted, but in the slightly dimmed light of the lab they were transformed into ovals. He held John’s gaze for a moment then turned back to the phone, his thumbs pressing the keys with as much ease as any human.

John turned again to Mike, but he didn’t offer any answers. Shifting his weight, a little uncomfortable now, John replied, “Afghanistan. Sorry, how did you —?”

The door opened behind John, and the dragon cut him off before he could finish. “Ah, Molly, coffee. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” she replied, letting out a breath that might have been trying to be a laugh. She looked nervous, and John wondered if that was because she was in the presence of a dragon.

The dragon himself seemed oblivious to her staring. He passed John his phone before taking the mug from her and, in one fluid motion, passed the coffee into the prehensile grip of his tail and dropped down onto all fours. He strode back towards the experiment he had been working on before, his tail carrying the drink across the room without spilling.

“OK, bye,” Molly said breathlessly, and fled.

At the other end of the room, the dragon transferred his coffee back into his claws and took a drink while his eyes scanned a computer screen. He asked, “How do you feel about the violin?”

“Sorry, what?” John asked. Mike was smiling at him, as though John and the dragon were a highly amusing floor show.

“I play the violin when I’m thinking,” the dragon said, hitting a few buttons on the computer’s keyboard. John was too busy gaping at the concept of a dragon playing a musical instrument intended for human hands to reply. Did he use his tail or just his claws? The dragon went on almost without pause, distracting him from the thought. “Sometimes I don’t talk for days on end.” He turned to look at John, his expression curious. “Would that bother you? Potential flatmates should know the worst about each other.”

The dragon’s mouth curved into a smile, his eyes creasing. The expression didn’t look remotely draconic, or genuine for that matter.

John blinked, then frowned and founded on Mike. “You — you told him about me?”

Then he wondered when the other man had found the time. They hadn’t been apart since the park. Mike, however, shook his head. “Not a word.”

“Then who said anything about flatmates?” John asked, looking back at the dragon and wondering why Mike had thought he could share a home with this creature in the first place. It was a dragon, and dragons were hardly house pets. Most had custom-built pavilions these days, though there were some that still preferred the outdoors. He had never heard of a dragon living in a flat, let alone with a human flatmate. It didn’t seem real.

“I did,” the dragon said, turning away and picking up a long scarf, which he folded into a loop and tucked into place around his long neck. “I told Mike this morning that I must be difficult to find a flatmate for. Now here he is, just after lunch, with an old friend clearly just home from military service in Afghanistan.” He twisted to look at John over one shoulder. “Wasn’t a difficult leap.”

John’s curiosity got the better of him. “How did you know about Afghanistan?”

“Got my eye on a nice little place in central London,” the dragon continued as if he hadn’t heard. He tapped the keyboard one last time, then dropped onto all fours to cross the room. “Together we ought to be able to afford it.” He came to a halt in front of John and looked at him for a second before stretching his neck up and back until their eyes were level. “We’ll meet there tomorrow evening, seven o’clock. Sorry, got to dash, I left my riding crop in the mortuary.”

John barely had time to wonder why on earth a dragon owned a riding crop and what he’d been doing with it in the mortuary when the dragon gave him another practiced smile and he brushed past him on his way to the door, scales whispering against his coat.

“Is that it?” John asked. The longer this conversation went on, the more he believed he was going to wake up in his bedsit to the sound of his alarm in a few moments. Still, he had to admit, this was a better dream than the flashbacks.

“Is that what?” the dragon said, turning and rising up onto its haunches so that he could more easily maintain eye contact without having to look up or crane his neck.

“We’ve only just met, and we’re going to go and look at a flat?” John said.

The dragon turned his head towards Mike, then back to John. “Problem?”

John glanced in Mike’s direction, smiling, half expecting him to say that this was all some kind of joke. People didn’t share flats with dragons. The idea was ludicrous. But Mike was still regarding them as though they were a form of entertainment, and he offered absolutely no help. John looked back at the dragon. “We don’t know a thing about each other. I don’t know where we’re meeting, I don’t even know your name.”

Mentioning that he was a dragon on top of all that seemed so obvious, even compared to these other, similarly apparent issues, that it hardly seemed worth mentioning.

The dragon tilted his muzzle down slightly, his eyes fixing John with an intent gaze. “I know you’re an army doctor and you’ve been invalided home from Afghanistan. I know you’ve got a brother who’s worried about you, but you won’t go to him for help because you don’t approve of him — possibly because he’s an alcoholic, more likely because he recently walked out on his wife. And I know that your therapist thinks that your limp’s psychosomatic, quite correctly, I’m afraid.”

John looked down at his leg. He felt as though he had been stripped bare. There was no way this dragon could know those things about him. It seemed impossible.

“That’s enough to be going on with, don’t you think?” the dragon added. Sarcasm, John thought dimly. That was new, for a dragon.

The dragon, whose name John still didn’t know, used his tail to operate the handle and pull the door open. He was half way through when he paused and reared up onto his hind legs, curving his neck back to peer around the door.

“The name’s Sherlock, and the address is 221b Baker Street,” he said. Then he winked one large, silvery eye, made a chirruping sound in the back of his throat that was purely draconic, and whirled out of the laboratory.

John watched through the narrow glass pane in the door as the dragon trotted away at high speed, then turned to look at Mike.

“Yeah,” he offered, nodding. “He’s always like that.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was all I ever wrote on this idea back in 2012, but I was planning for it to be a (much) longer fic. The plan was to have John become Sherlock's Captain (definitely in name only!) to allow him to work with the police, because of the rules around dragons in this modern-day version of the Temeraire universe. (I suppose having a human contact would also give clients a sense of reassurance that someone could keep this dragon in check. Ha ha ha.) Mycroft is definitely also a dragon, and I think Moriarty probably is too.
> 
> Sadly I'm never going to write the rest of the fic now, but I figured this standalone scene was interesting enough to post by itself. Hope you enjoyed it if you read this far!


End file.
